Sunday, March 1, 2015

"David Hartsough knows how to get in the way. He has used his body to
block Navy ships headed for Vietnam and trains loaded with munitions on
their way to El Salvador and Nicaragua. He has crossed borders to meet
“the enemy” in East Berlin, Castro’s Cuba, and present-day Iran. He has
marched with mothers confronting a violent regime in Guatemala and stood
with refugees threatened by death squads in the Philippines.
Hartsough’s stories inspire, educate, and encourage readers to find ways
to work for a more just and peaceful world. Inspired by the examples of
Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr., Hartsough has spent his life
experimenting with the power of active nonviolence. Engaging stories on
every page provide a peace activist’s eyewitness account of many of the
major historical events of the past 60 years, including the Civil
Rights and anti–Vietnam War movements in the United States as well as
the little-known but equally significant nonviolent efforts in the
Soviet Union, Kosovo, Palestine, Sri Lanka, and the Philippines. Waging Peace
is a testament to the difference one person can make; however, it is
more than one man’s memoir: it shows how this struggle is waged all over
the world by ordinary people committed to ending the spiral of violence
and war."

Sunday, February 15, 2015

Sarah L. Blum, ARNP is a decorated nurse Vietnam veteran who earned the
Army Commendation Medal serving as an operating room nurse at the 12th
Evacuation Hospital Cu Chi, Vietnam during the height of the fighting in
1967. Because Cu Chi sat on the edge of the Hobo Woods, where all the
fighting took place in 1967, her hospital handled mass casualties
regularly and their operating room became the largest user of fresh
blood in all of Vietnam
Back in the United States, Sarah received her brother soldiers of
Vietnam with their wounds and amputations, cared for them directly and
saw how their physical wounds did not heal when their heads and hearts
were deeply affected. She was awarded the Certificate of Achievement for
exemplary service as head nurse of the orthopedic ward at Madigan Army
Hospital in 1968, where she was also the assistant director of nursing
on evening and night shift in 1970.

Thursday, February 12, 2015

This is my mother’s word, it means to be
nosey, pushy and a general pain in the ass. It sometimes means having an
attitude the size of Montana on your shoulders and projecting that all over the
place. Generally this is not a nice thing but can be used in a nice context.

Nuke: To attack with a nuclear weapon,
or to otherwise bring about widespread and utter destruction.

I’d like to thank the universal
goodness that former comedian cum death monger Roseanne Barr does not (I hope)
have access to nuclear weapons.

I say “former” comedian because
in the last few years Barr has taken a decidedly unfunny turn and outlook on
life.

After Barr accused Green Party
presidential candidate Dr. Jill Stein of being a “Zionist” in the 2012 Green
Party primaries (which Stein won and Barr lost) and after running for president
on the ticket of the stridently antiwar Peace and Freedom Party, Barr has used
her Twitter account to become a mega-Zionist. I stopped following her after she
urged Israel to nuke Iran. As a human being, nothing to me is more monstrous.

Recently, the person who used
her acting skills to convince me and the Peace and Freedom Party that she was
also about peace tweeted this to her almost 300k followers on Twitter:

This tweet was apparently in
response to the vote to divest from Israeli investments of UC Davis. The tweet
is shocking in its callousness. I understand the tweet was left up for about 10
hours before some cooler head prevailed and it was removed, but as we can see,
nothing online ever really gets deleted.

As universally shocking as this
tweet is and how revealing it is of the character of the person who did tweet
it, I live about 20 miles from UC Davis. As most people over the age of 10
know, nuclear devastation is not confined to a very small geographic area. Personally,
it is very painful that Barr would love to see my family, including my five
grandchildren who also live this close to Davis, die a very torturous death
because we are not “Jews.”

On the other hand, what if she
tweeted this: “I hope all Gentiles leave UC Davis and then it gets nuked.” How
long do you think it would be before she was in Gitmo being treated as a
terrorist? As much as I deplore her actual tweet, I would deplore one that
wanted to incinerate Jews just as strongly.

As a member of the Peace and
Freedom Party (I want to iterate that I am NOT speaking in that capacity and
only speaking for myself) I would like to reaffirm OUR position against war and the
use of nuclear weapons.

The Peace and Freedom Party was
born out of the struggle against the Vietnam War and the government’s violent
repression of those protests. The Party has long been committed to its name:
Peace and Freedom. Until the Green Party got ballot access here in California,
we were the only party that offered legitimate opposition to the two parties
that will (and have) used nuclear weapons.

I have also received several
messages about my relationship to my former running mate: even though I saw the
writing on the wall while I was running against her and wrote this:

The few weeks that I was her
running mate were devastating for me. I had known Roseanne for years before
that star-crossed collaboration and I considered her a friend.

Roseanne was flawed, of course,
as are we all. But I saw a person who I truly believed was committed to the
same principles that I was, but Twitter is not Barr’s friend and she started to
tweet some things that were 180 degrees from the platform of the party and my
own personal platform, such as: “If people go on welfare, birth control should
be mandatory.”

Side note: I also disagreed
that our entire campaign should be by tweet, especially ones that were so
contrary to what we, as a party, stand for.

Then some people have defended
her most recent foray into outrageousness by saying exactly that, “She is
famous for saying outrageous things.” Well, so am I, but I only consider what I
say outrageous in the context of Imperial Capitalism like, “war of aggression
is always wrong.”

Common sense dictates that there
is a profound difference between what someone says in the heat of passion (and
obviously Roseanne is passionate in her hatred of non-Jews) and what one takes
the time to type out (probably via iPhone) in a carefully crafted tweet. I
cannot think of any clearer expression of hatred that is more evil than wishing
a large part of Northern California be destroyed or radiated all for one
principled vote.

P.T. Barnum once said, “Publicity
is not measured in content, but inches,” and Roseanne’s public persona has now
completely turned into a circus: the kind that abuses animals and is filled
with horrific clowns (oops, that’s all circuses).

The moral of this story is if a
party has “Peace” in its name and platform, let’s more carefully vet our next
POTUS pick to make sure that he/she would not use his/her power to push the
button of a deadly weapon of mass destruction.

Tuesday, February 10, 2015

The Obama Files is Cindy Sheehan's latest book. The book is a six-year long chronicle of the hypocrisy of the US Empire and the abdication of the "left" in calling out the war crimes of "the first black US president."

Cindy's work shows clear-thinking and understanding of the truth behind the Empire of lies, but this is not a book about "gloating:" meant to awaken people to these truths that should be "self-evident" by now!

The Obama Files is now in its final stages of production and if you pre-order a copy today, you will get one of the first ones hot off the presses, signed by the author.

SPECIAL PREVIEW OF THE FOREWORD BY THE FABULOUS BROTHER LARRY PINKNEY:

Foreword to The Obama Files: Chronicles of an Award Winning War Criminal

by Larry Pinkney

Though often hidden or distorted, human history is replete
with examples of courage and sacrifice by a relatively few political dissenters
sounding the alarm and speaking truth to power. These dissenters are scorned
and ridiculed by those who control the corporate mass media and its concomitant
systemic machine of perpetual war, death, and destruction. Yet, US society in
particular, and Mother Earth as a whole, are in dire need of these principled
dissenters whose stories represent the very best of struggling humanity. This
is the essence of Cindy Sheehan and why her actions and writings over many
years are of such invaluable and enduring significance. She has repeatedly actualized
the words of the late Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., when he said, “Our lives begin
to end the day we become silent about things that matter...”

“Cindy’s voice—righteous, outraged, and uncompromising,
rises from these pages like a messenger from the future compelled by a deep
knowledge of our past transgressions to sound an alarm. One can heed her
warning and follow her call or remain silent, and in doing so, remain violent.”
– Dennis Trainor, Jr. | writer, filmmaker, activist

“The Clash once sang about that opportunistic breed of rebel
that inevitably ‘joins the church.’ Cindy Sheehan, however, has never and will
never tow the company line. As The Obama
Files passionately articulates, the work of a true dissident requires one
to avoid easy compromises and comfortable alliances. This book—and all of
Cindy’s work—is a testament to the long term vision of collective liberation.”
– Mickey Z. | author of Occupy this Book

“Cindy Sheehan’s many books document her transformation from a woman whose
‘entire world was my family and this suburban intellectually challenged
sinkhole’ to an
international activist with humanity and the whole planet in her thoughts and
big heart.
In The Obama Files she excoriates the
world of presidential assassination
programs; pre-emptive indefinite detention; spreading government surveillance,
police
brutalizing and killing people of color in the Obama years. Even as I
share much of her
critique and experience in calling out crimes of the Democrats, I am choked up
at Cindy’s
deep outrage. She continues to call us to resist the crimes done in our
name, and
to join in creating a world where people will be free. – Debra Sweet | National
Coordinator of World Can’t Wait

“As far as I’m concerned, Obama has continued and expanded
on all of Bush’s worst policies. I never supported him. Like Cindy, I knew
better. After my years of activism, I learned that the system does NOT work for
the people. I have been very fortunate to work alongside Cindy throughout most
of Obama’s presidency. Because of that, I’ve read most of her articles, and
listened to most of her podcasts. The corporate media would lead you to believe
that Cindy went away after Obama came into office. If you want to see how wrong
they were, and how consistent Cindy has been, read this book. If you want to
see how much of a war criminal Obama has been, read this book.” – Jon Gold | 9/11
Truth Activist and author

Though often hidden or distorted, human history is replete
with examples of courage and sacrifice by a relatively few political dissenters
sounding the alarm and speaking truth to power. These dissenters are scorned
and ridiculed by those who control the corporate mass media and its concomitant
systemic machine of perpetual war, death, and destruction. Yet, US society in
particular, and Mother Earth as a whole, are in dire need of these principled
dissenters whose stories represent the very best of struggling humanity. This
is the essence of Cindy Sheehan and why her actions and writings over many
years are of such invaluable and enduring significance. She has repeatedly actualized
the words of the late Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., when he said, “Our lives begin
to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”

After suffering the terrible loss of her son Casey, in the US
war on Iraq, in 2004, Cindy Sheehan demonstrated an unshakable commitment to
raise awareness nationally and internationally about 1) the underlying and
unacceptable causes of war; 2) who the real purveyors of war actually
are; and 3) the inextricable connection of—militarism and war—to poverty,
corporate hegemony, the obliteration of human rights, ‘racism,’ and the de
facto state sponsored ‘terrorism’ against humanity carried out as an integral
part of the national and global surveillance police-state.

In the stalwart tradition of Rosa Luxemburg, Lucy Parsons,
Fannie Lou Hamer, and so many other courageous women and men of all colors,
Cindy Sheehan has taken her message directly to everyday ordinary people. In
plain language she urges people to critically think, and to link the issues together
in order to bring about an end to the insane militarism, corporate greed, and
environmental ravaging of our Mother Earth.

Well before the conclusion of the eight years of G.W. Bush’s
disastrous rule of perpetual war and unspeakable horrors abroad and at home,
the tiny US corporate/military power elite was preparing and grooming a
successor who would continue and substantively exacerbate the same Bush
policies, while insidiously and effectively masquerading as someone who would
bring about genuine change on behalf of the suffering masses in the US and
globally. This successor and articulate political conjurer was Barack Obama—Mr.
‘hope and change,’ whose second largest 2008 Obama campaign contributor was
none other than Wall Street’s notorious corporate blood-sucking Goldman Sachs.
Thus, in 2008, the handwriting was in fact already on the wall, but with the
complicity of the US corporate-stream mass media and numerous so-called
‘progressives,’ etc., the majority of everyday struggling people were
thoroughly and cynically bamboozled to their own detriment. Indeed, on the third
day of his first term as US President, Barack Obama mercilessly droned the
sovereign nation of Pakistan, murdering children, women, and men
non-combatants. Subsequently, Obama has gone on to massively increase
the use of deadly US drone attacks upon many other sovereign nations in
Africa, Asia, and the so-called ‘Middle East.’ It is estimated that at least 90
percent of the victims murdered and/or maimed by US killer drone attacks are
non-combatant children, women, and men. Thus, Obama spawns more rage and hatred
as a result of these ongoing killer drone attacks, and with it, the concomitant
spiral of terror and perpetual war.

Prior to 2009, when Barack Obama was officially installed as
the nominally ‘black’ designated standard bearer for the US system of global
Empire at home and abroad, there were precious few who had the principled
courage to sound the alarm. Fortunately for us all, Cindy Sheehan and a
relative handful of other dissenters, refused to be complicit with, or silenced
by, the nauseating and deafening chorus in those days by the supporters of
corporate brand Obama’s euphoria of madnesson the US
Democrat/Republican plantation of the damned.

Not satisfied with his war crimes abroad, the wily
corporate-controlled Drone Man Barack Obama, in service to the
corporate/military elite, has bestowed upon himself his very own ‘kill
list’—empowering him to target and have killed at will, individuals of any
nationality (including US citizens) in the US, or anywhere else in the world,
whom he, as judge, jury, and executioner, decides must die. This is Barack
Obama’s so-called ‘hope and change.’ Whatever happened to international law and
the US Constitution?

Barack Obama’s repeated annual signing of the so-called
National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which includes an outrageous
unconstitutional provision authorizing the indefinite detention of any
person or persons in the US without the due process ofa legal defense attorney, a jury of one’s
peers, or even an open trial is—onerous and utterly unacceptable—and is yet
another indication of Obama’s hypocritical and arrogant disdain for the US
Constitution, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the International
Covenant On Civil and Political Rights.

Cindy Sheehan has long made the connection between US
militarism abroad and political repression, including the militarization of the
police, at home. Thanks to her courage and diligence, an increasing number of
people are becoming aware of just how relevant and extremely important making
these connections are to our very survival as human beings on this precious
planet of Mother Earth.

It is with a sense of urgency that this book containing the
writings of Cindy Sheehan—particularly as they pertain to Barack Obama and the
current US political system—need to be read and re-read with a view
towards making a critical analysis of the recent past, in order to bring about
a seismic political change in the US and avert an even larger pending
political, economic, and social future disaster in the year 2015 and beyond.

May you be inspired to creative action by the clarity and
cutting-edge honesty of Cindy Sheehan’s writings in this book!

Larry Pinkneyis a veteran of the Black Panther Party, the former Minister of
Interior of the Republic of New Africa, a former political prisoner and the
only American to have successfully self-authored his civil/political rights
case to the United Nations under the International Covenant on Civil and
Political Rights. In connection with his political organizing activities,
Pinkney was interviewed in 1988 on the nationally televised PBS News Hour,
formerly known as The MacNeil/Lehrer News Hour, and more recently on the nationally
syndicated Alex Jones Show, and RT (formerly known as Russia Today). He is
currently founder and curator of theBlack Activist Writers Guild (BAWG)
BlackActivistwg.org (Click here: Black Activist Writers Guild).Pinkney is a
former university instructor of political science and international relations,
and his writings have been published in various places, including The Boston
Globe, San Francisco BayView newspaper, Black Commentator, Intrepid Report,
Global Research (Canada), LINKE ZEITUNG (Germany), 107 Cowgate (Ireland and
Scotland), and Mayihlome News (Azania/South Africa).He is in the archives of Dr. Huey P. Newton
(Stanford University, CA), cofounder of the Black Panther Party. For more about
Larry Pinkney see the book, Saying No to Power: Autobiography of a 20th
Century Activist and Thinker, by William Mandel [Introduction by Howard
Zinn]. (Click struggle-and-win.net Bill Mandel on Larry Pinkney to read excerpts from the book.)

Sunday, February 1, 2015

Justin Colella is an American entrepreneur, philosopher, social
activist, producer, and philanthropist. He started his first company at
the age of 19 and has been self-employed ever since. He is currently
President at Commission Enterprises, Inc. and other sales and marketing
corporations that engage in guerrilla marketing for Fortune 50 and
Fortune 500 clients. Mr. Colella is also Founder and Chairman of the
501(c)(3) Non-Profit Human Rights Organization, Hustle For Humanity. He
is a Licensed Master Practitioner of Neuro-Linguistic Programming, a
Doctorate level Clinical Hypnotherapist, and an elected member of the
American Psychological Association (APA). He currently resides in
Southern California and is a competitive athlete in Boxing, Mixed
Martial Arts and CrossFit. Justin Colella is currently working on a
documentary film project set to be released in 2015 that promises to
challenge the existing global political, psychological, and economic
paradigm.

I have long advocated for the
seat of the central government of the USA be relocated to the geographic center
of the contiguous land mass. Along with the many problems associated with the
capital city built on a swamp, depending on where one lives, it can be
expensive and inconvenient as hell to get to!

The geographic concerns and
the seeming minimal interest in ending the wars combine to make trips to DC (or
NYC, or Chicago, or Los Angeles) difficult for most. I rode my bike from
California to DC in 2013, but not many people are full-time peace activists and
can’t afford the time it takes (three months for me) or the time off of work.

So what do we do? Most of us
who are still in this “antiwar” milieu have realized that the president of the
US is really just a figurehead for Empire and that Congress is there to
rubberstamp what the War Machine wants with very little show of opposition; so
Why DC?

DC is the marbleized logo of
power. I am not sure where decisions are really made, but I know the Imperial
Pronouncements emanate from DC and I also know that large gatherings of
courageous and determined humans have changed history in a positive way.

Spring Rising: An Antiwar
Intervention in DC is our call to gather there from March 18-21 for four days
of action designed to once and for all end the wars. Realistically, will this
happen? We know it won’t happen if we all cocoon in our comfort zones.

We think it’s urgent for the
planet to gather with us for these days (schedule), but if it’s not possible
for you to meet us in DC, please organize local solidarity actions and we will
be happy to help you connect with others in your area, if possible.

One person emailed to tell me
that when we call for gathering in DC, it’s just our way of getting others to
pay our ways there.

That’s a valid concern, but
the organizations that are pulling this together are grassroots and not all of
us think that “WashedUp, DeCeit” is an ideal place to spend a week. DC is
really one of the last places I want to go to, but I have been there countless of
times to protest and I can’t think of much site seeing that I have done. It’s a
place that whitely shines with war memorial after war memorial but has an
underlying feeling of black cancer. However, it’s also the place where a
massive response needs to be mounted against the massive police state that is
apparent there. We can’t wait for the “elected” War Criminals to grow a
conscience—because historically few have had one. We can’t wait for others—we must
be the ones.

Please email Dede Miller if you would like
help organizing a local solidarity action, or get on your own network and
figure out how to rideshare to join us.

Surprise, the US Attorney Has Filed a Law Suit Against You! Cindy Sheehan It’s not a secret, and hasn’t been one for about ...

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MISSION STATEMENT

Cindy Sheehan's Soapbox is an independent online radio show and blog that strives to be completely free from establishment political ideology and focus on a message of peace, justice, environmental sustainability and economic equality. To this end, we provide educational and inspirational programs on topics related to these issues and we organize/promote actions working towards peace, justice, and environmental sustainability.